Juneteenth
1 journaler for this copy...
It's difficult to "summarize" this novel, a posthumously-published editor's version of a fragmentary manuscript. Apparently Ellison had hoped to go much more deeply into the lives of two men--one a bigoted white Southern senator, the other the black minister who raised him from infancy to youth--and the incomplete story of their relationship and how it changed over time isn't exactly satisfying. What is are Ellison's style and language, his insights and surprises. OK, so I felt weighed down by the senator's opening speech, and was stymied by chapter 2 with the senator's all-but-incoherent interior monologue as he hovers near death in a hospital after being shot. But great writers take great chances. Ellison had no final approval before Juneteenth's publication but he did entrust 40 years of work to a friend, John Callahan. I'm glad Callahan, too, took a chance by piecing together this bit of Ellison's long-awaited second novel. Better "flawed" Ellison--if that's what it is--than none.
Sending this one to Kentucky.